ASA141
Week 9
In this week's reading, Frith et. al compared and contrasted Western and Asian advertisements and how women are portrayed in them. I occasionally keep up with popular Korean culture and have been seeing its popularity grow in the U.S. and globally throughout these past few years. Often times, I see that Korean female celebrities and idols are either portrayed as the “cute girl-next-door” or the “spunky girl crush.” On the other hand, American media usually portrays women as “sexy” and objectifies their bodies by accentuating certain physical assets.
I have been seeing Western vs Korean makeup articles and videos. In the U.S., makeup is very heavy and much darker than Koreans. Korean makeup is light and barely noticeable at times which makes Korean woman look more youthful rather than older and sultry. In this video, the Korean women are shocked with how they look with “Instagram Baddie” makeup and it makes me think of how different the beauty standards are.
It also makes me think that with different beauty standards and media portrayal, Western women may be perceived to be more physically attractive than Asian women. I find this interesting because Asian women are usually hypersexualized or seen as submissive in the Orientalist lens but in Asian beauty advertisements, they don’t primarily focus on those things. I question why do the West have beauty standards that emphasize sexuality whereas most of the East doesn’t?
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